Ships are now moving out of Hormuz under IMO-controlled evacuation routing.
The Strait is open for managed exit, but not restored to normal commercial passage.
1. Hormuz Evacuation Moves From Plan to Actual Transit as UK Minehunting Force Arrives
• Ships have now begun sailing through the Strait of Hormuz under the IMO evacuation scheme for vessels trapped inside the Gulf.
• Reuters reports at least two dry bulk ships and one cargo ship crossed in the previous 12 hours under the scheme.
• A further 35 smaller vessels, including dry bulk, cargo, container ships, five oil tankers and tugs, were preparing to sail through the Strait.
• The scheme uses two temporary exit tracks: a northern route via Iranian waters and a southern route through Sultanate of Oman / United States coordinated waters.
• Royal Navy support ship RFA Lyme Bay has deployed with uncrewed boats, underwater sensors, autonomous sonar equipment and more than 100 specialist minehunting personnel for a potential Strait of Hormuz mission.
• The mine-countermeasures deployment gives the evacuation phase a visible multinational clearance layer, but it does not yet mean the central traffic lanes are safe for routine use.
2. Tanker and Energy Flows Restart Selectively, Not Normally
• Three stranded crude tankers carrying about 5 million barrels have exited Hormuz, adding previously trapped Gulf crude back into the export flow.
• The vessels include VL Breeze, carrying Qatari and Abu Dhabi oil to South Korea, Plata Carrier carrying Saudi crude to India, and Prudent Warrior heading toward Oman with Iraqi oil.
• Reuters reports that only eight of 26 previously stranded oil tankers have departed so far.
• Nine LNG tankers are now en route to Qatar, the highest number since the conflict began, as energy shipping begins to test the reopening limits.
3. Commercial Layer: Stranded Tonnage and Container Rates Keep Pressure On
• Between 500 and 600 ships remain stranded inside the Gulf, including as many as 100 tankers.
• The IMO initiative supports evacuation out of the Gulf, but does not support vessels entering to lift fresh oil cargoes from Gulf producers.
• Drewry’s World Container Index rose 12% to USD 3,969 per 40ft container, the highest level in 18 months.
• Shanghai to New York spot rates rose 15% to USD 6,769 per 40ft container, while Shanghai to Los Angeles rose 10% to USD 5,142.
4. Navigation and Safety Layer: Central TSS Remains Unavailable
• The central Hormuz Traffic Separation Scheme is currently not usable because of mine risk.
• IMO instructions require vessels to wait for individual movement orders before proceeding.
• The IMO warning states that crowding the waiting area could force further notifications to be paused for navigational safety.
• AIS visibility remains degraded, with some vessel movements potentially undetected because of signal disruption and ships not showing public movements through the Strait.
5. Technical and Compliance Layer: DNV Sets OCCS Verification Framework
• DNV has published DNV-RP-0698, a recommended practice for measuring and verifying onboard carbon capture and storage system performance.
• The framework covers capture rate, captured CO2 quantity, emissions to atmosphere and gross capture efficiency.
• DNV says the RP is technology-neutral and applies across pre-combustion, post-combustion, oxy-fuel and other OCCS approaches.
• Technical managers should treat OCCS claims as a verification and documentation issue, not a vendor-performance claim alone.
Strategic Summary & Actions Required
• Masters assigned Hormuz exit should treat the passage as controlled evacuation, not restored normal transit, and verify route allocation, waiting orders, AIS/LRIT settings, abort criteria and bridge-team manning before movement.
• Ship managers, DPA/CSO teams and insurers should require written voyage authority, war-risk approval, P&I position, coastal-state instructions, naval deconfliction contacts and charterer confirmation before releasing any Gulf exit plan.
• Charterers and operators should separate outbound evacuation rights from inbound cargo-lifting permission, and price fixtures against delayed slots, mine-risk routing, escort dependency, AIS disruption and off-hire exposure.
• Tanker, LNG and container desks should avoid treating higher outbound flows as full normalization while 500 to 600 vessels remain stranded and the central TSS remains unavailable.
• Technical managers assessing OCCS retrofits should align vendor performance claims with DNV-RP-0698 metrics, third-party verification needs, port CO2 offloading assumptions and future IMO guidance.
Operational Status
CRITICAL RED — Hormuz Evacuation / UK Mine-Countermeasures Deployment / Temporary North and South Tracks / Central TSS Mine Risk / Controlled Outbound Movement Only
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Sources
IMO, Reuters, Royal Navy, Drewry, DNV
This update is part of the DeepDraft SITREP series covering developing maritime operational situations.
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